Method and apparatus for tracking activity of a garbage collector with a plurality of threads that operate concurrently with an application program

ABSTRACT

The time cost of collecting a region in a Garbage-First garbage collector is adjusted to account for concurrent thread activity. The overhead of a concurrent thread is tracked by dividing elapsed time into relatively short time “windows” and monitoring the system during those windows to determine how long that thread is scheduled to run during those windows. Using measurements of this type for each concurrent thread, the percentage of each elapsed time window dedicated to each concurrent thread is determined. Finally, by summing the percentages of elapsed time dedicated to concurrent thread activity, the cost of collecting a region can be increased by adding the overhead attributable to concurrent activity.

BACKGROUND

This invention relates to automatic reclamation of allocated, but unusedmemory, or garbage, in a computer system that uses a space-incrementalgarbage collector to process an object space concurrently with theoperation of application threads. Memory reclamation may be carried outby a special-purpose garbage collection algorithm that locates andreclaims dynamically assigned memory (called “heap” memory) that isunused, but has not been explicitly de-allocated. There are many knowngarbage collection algorithms, including reference counting, mark-sweep,mark-compact and generational garbage collection algorithms. These, andother garbage collection techniques, are described in detail in a bookentitled “Garbage Collection, Algorithms for Automatic Dynamic MemoryManagement” by Richard Jones and Raphael Lins, John Wiley & Sons, 1996.

However, many of the aforementioned garbage collection techniques oftenlead to long and unpredictable delays because normal application threadprocessing must be suspended during the garbage collection process(called “stop the world” or STW processing) and these collectors atleast occasionally scan the entire heap memory. Therefore, thesetechniques are generally not suitable in situations, such as real-timeor interactive systems, where non-disruptive behavior is of greatestimportance. Several other conventional techniques are typically used toalleviate these delays.

In accordance with one such technique, some garbage collectors operatemostly concurrently with the operation of the application threads. Forexample, in collectors that mark reachable objects by followingreferences from one object to another, the marking may be done bythreads that operate mostly concurrently with the application threads.Memory associated with objects that remain unmarked at the end of themarking operation can then be reclaimed sometimes also concurrently withapplication execution.

Another solution for limiting pause times is to use a space incrementalgarbage collector. In such a collector, during each successivecollection increment, which typically (but not necessarily) is performedduring a single pause in the application execution, the collectorprocesses a small portion, or “collection set”, of the heap memory. Thisapproach can often limit pause time adequately without the complexity ofrequiring the collector to operate concurrently with the application.

However, all of the aforementioned collectors introduce pauses ofvarying duration. Often the duration of the pauses is difficult topredict so that for some applications these collectors presentdifficulties. Thus, some collectors allow the user to specify the amountof garbage collection time relative to application execution time sothat the worst-case duration of pauses can be predicted. For example, auser might specify that x milliseconds of application execution are tobe followed by y milliseconds of garbage collection time. An example ofsuch a garbage collector is described in an article entitled “AReal-time Garbage Collector with Low Overhead and ConsistentUtilization”, D. F. Bacon, P. Cheng and V. T. Rajan, Conference Recordof the Thirtieth Annual ACM Symposium on Principles of ProgrammingLanguages, ACM SIGPLAN Notices, New Orleans, La. January 2003.

Another similar approach called “Garbage-First” garbage collection usesa space-incremental collection technique and also performs operations,such as marking, concurrently with the operation of the application.This collector allows a user to specify a “soft” real-time goal thatgarbage collection will consume a maximum of MaxGC milliseconds out ofany application execution time window of duration TW milliseconds. Thisgoal is illustrated in the graphs shown in FIGS. 1, 2A and 2B. In thesegraphs, the horizontal axis represents time increasing towards theright. The vertical axis represents garbage collector overheadincreasing in an upwards direction. As shown in FIG. 1, the real-timegoal is based on a window 100 of duration TW. This window slides to theright (in the direction of increasing time). For example, the window isshown at position 102 after an elapsed time of S milliseconds.

In FIG. 2A, a STW pause 202 of time duration MaxGC is illustrated as ifoccurring in time window 200. In this illustration a single pauseconsumes the entire allotted garbage collection time. Since allapplication threads are stopped during the pause, the garbage collectoroverhead rises to 100 percent. A more frequent occurrence is shown inFIG. 2B in which three garbage collection STW pauses 206, 208 and 210occur in a time window 204 of TW milliseconds duration. In this case thereal-time goal would be to make the time durations of these windows lessthan the allotted garbage collection time: D1+D2+D3≦MaxGC.

Although the collector does not guarantee to meet this real-time goal,it attempts to do so with high probability. To attempt to achieve thereal-time goal, the collector accounts for current garbage collectionactivity and then schedules future activity. To schedule futureactivity, the collector deals with heap regions and has a model of thetime cost of collecting a particular heap region as a function ofquickly-measured properties of that region. Using these time costs, thecollector can choose a set of heap regions that can be collected withina given pause time limit (with high probability). Further, collection isdelayed if necessary (and possible) until a pause of a given durationcan be accommodated to avoid violating the real-time goal.

However, in meeting the real-time goal, the garbage first garbagecollector only considers pauses and does not take into account theamount of concurrent marking and summarizing that actually takes placeduring its operation. Consequently, its predictions are not as accurateas they could be.

SUMMARY

In accordance with the principles of the invention, the time cost ofcollecting a region in a Garbage-First garbage collector is adjusted toaccount for concurrent garbage collector thread activity. The overheadof a concurrent garbage collector thread is tracked by dividing elapsedtime into relatively short time “windows” and monitoring the systemduring those windows to determine how long that thread is scheduled torun during those windows. Using measurements of this type for eachconcurrent garbage collector thread, the percentage of each elapsed timewindow dedicated to each concurrent garbage collector thread isdetermined. Finally, by summing the percentages of elapsed timededicated to concurrent garbage collector thread activity, the cost ofcollecting a region can be increased by adding the overhead attributableto concurrent activity.

In one embodiment, each concurrent garbage collector thread monitors itsown activity and stores information in a data structure that issubsequently read by the garbage collector and used to account forconcurrent activity.

In another embodiment, individual garbage collector thread measurementscan be smoothed by various techniques to deal with small variations inthe measurements.

In still another embodiment, variations in the overhead of theconcurrent activity that appear when concurrent marking begins and endsare accounted for explicitly.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

FIG. 1 is a graph that illustrates the time window on which a real-timegarbage collection goal is based.

FIG. 2A is a graph that illustrates a time window in which all of thegarbage collection activity takes place during a single STW pause.

FIG. 2B is a graph that illustrates a time window in which all of thegarbage collection activity takes place during several STW pauses.

FIG. 3 is a graph that illustrates a time window in which the garbagecollection activity takes place during several STW pauses and duringconcurrent activity that occur continuously during the window.

FIG. 4 is a block schematic diagram showing how garbage collectorthreads that operate concurrently measure their own virtual time withinan elapsed time window and store the result in a local data structure.

FIG. 5 is a block schematic diagram illustrating the operation of athread that calculates a total overhead percentage for all concurrentgarbage collector threads from the local data structures.

FIG. 6 is a flowchart showing the steps in an illustrative process forcalculating an overhead percentage for all concurrent garbage collectorthreads from the common data structure.

FIG. 7 is a block schematic diagram illustrating apparatus that adjustsquery parameters in a Garbage-First garbage collector to account forconcurrent thread garbage collector activity.

FIG. 8 is a flowchart showing the steps in an illustrative process foradjusting query parameters in a Garbage-First garbage collector toaccount for concurrent thread garbage collector activity.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

In the discussion below, a particular garbage collector known as the“Garbage-First” garbage collector is used as an example of agoal-driven, real-time garbage collector. However, those skilled in theart would realize that the principles of the invention apply to othersimilar goal-driven real-time collectors. The Garbage-First garbagecollector is described in general in “Garbage-First Garbage Collection”,D. Detlefs, C. Flood, S. Heller and A. Printezis, Proceedings of the 4thinternational symposium on Memory management, pp. 37-48, Vancouver, BC,Canada 2004 and in greater detail in U.S. patent application Ser. No.10/985,447, filed on Nov. 11, 2004 by D. Detlefs, S. Heller and A.Garthwaite and assigned to the same assignee as the present invention,both documents are incorporated in their entirety by reference herein.

As described in the aforementioned article and patent application, inorder to control the operation of the collector, the user supplies a“soft” real-time goal to the garbage collector. This goal is that theremust be no more than MaxGC ms of garbage collection time out of any timewindow of duration TW ms during which the application is executing. Thecollector then tries to schedule its garbage collection activity to meetthis goal with a high probability.

Garbage collection activity in the Garbage-First collector falls intotwo categories: STW activity that occurs when the garbage collectorstops the application to perform an operation that needs to take placeatomically with respect to the application and concurrent activity thatis performed by threads that operate concurrently with the application.This activity includes concurrent refinement, concurrent zero filling,and concurrent marking. Concurrent refinement and concurrent zerofilling are always being performed, whereas concurrent marking is onlyperformed part of the time. These activities are discussed in detail inthe aforementioned article and patent application.

Meeting the soft real-time goal requires that individual pauses do notexceed a pause time bound, and that pauses are scheduled so that onlythe allowed amount of garbage collection activity occurs in any timewindow. To meet a given pause time bound, a collection set that can becollected in the available time is chosen using the aforementioned timecost model to predict which regions can be collected.

The second requirement for meeting the real-time goal is scheduleevacuation pauses so that the garbage collection time in a time windowdoes not exceed the allowed limit. This scheduling is achieved bymaintaining a queue of start/stop time pairs for pauses that haveoccurred in the most recent time window, along with the total stop worldtime for pauses that have already occurred in that time window. Timepairs for pauses can be inserted at one end of this queue, which updatesthe start of the most recent time window, and may cause time pairs atthe other end to be deleted because they have become irrelevant. Thisqueue is also described in detail in the aforementioned article andpatent application. With this data structure, the following two queriescan be efficiently answered:

-   -   What is the longest pause that can be started now without        violating the real-time constraint?    -   What is the earliest time in the future at which a pause of a        given duration may be started?

These queries are then used to decide how long to delay activities thatwould otherwise be scheduled for processing immediately.

The invention relies on an observation that all of the concurrentactivity that the Garbage-First garbage collector performs imposes asubstantially uniform overhead on the application (in some cases, likeconcurrent refinement, deliberate steps were taken to “smooth” theoverhead introduced). This activity is shown schematically in the graphillustrated in FIG. 3. A time window 300 of duration TW is illustrated,during which two STW pauses 302 and 304 occur. However, concurrentactivity represented by 306 and 308 also occurs throughout the entirewindow 300. Although this activity varies somewhat over the duration ofthe window 300 and is the result of a plurality of concurrent threadswhich start and stop during the window, a substantially constant averagelevel Ov (312) occurs during the time window 300.

Based on this observation, the total concurrent overhead can beapproximated by calculating a percentage of elapsed time during whicheach concurrent thread is scheduled and then summing the percentages. Inparticular, for each concurrent thread, an overhead percentage iscalculated by considering a relatively short time window of elapsed time(ET) 310 and determining in that window, the virtual time (VT) duringwhich that thread was scheduled. For example, such a window could beapproximately 10 milliseconds in duration if the total time windowbetween STW pauses is approximately 30 milliseconds. This calculationcan be performed by a number of methods, however, in accordance with oneembodiment; each concurrent thread calculates its own overheadpercentage and stores it in a local data structure. This arrangement isillustrated in FIG. 4 which shows a group of concurrent threadstructures, of which three, 400, 402 and 404, are illustrated. Eachthread structure 400, 402 and 404 includes a local overhead calculator406, 408 and 410, respectively. As the local overhead calculators 406,408 and 410 in each thread are the same, only one calculator 406 isshown in detail.

Overhead calculator 406 includes a virtual time calculator 414 and anelapsed time calculator 412. The virtual time calculator 414 firstobtains a “virtual” time for the thread, or the time during which thethread has been scheduled since its inception. Typically, this virtualtime can be obtained from a facility maintained by the operating system.At the beginning of a time window, the virtual time calculator 414obtains and stores the virtual time in the local data structure 418 asschematically indicated by arrow 421. The elapsed time calculator 412also determines the current system time at the beginning of that timewindow, using for example, a system call that returns the current systemtime. This elapsed time is then stored in the local data structure 418as indicated by arrow 420. At the end of the time window, the virtualtime calculator 414 again obtains a virtual time for the thread andstores this latter virtual time in the local data structure 418.Similarly, at the end of the time window, the elapsed time calculator412 again obtains an elapsed time for the thread and stores this latterelapsed time in the local data structure 418.

Later, the garbage collector thread may decide to compute its virtualtime (VT), elapsed time (ET) and percentage overhead for the time window(VT/ET). In order to perform this calculation, the virtual timecalculator 414 retrieves the stored virtual times for the beginning andthe end of the time window from the local data structure 418 andcomputes the difference (VT) between the starting value and the endingvalue. The virtual time difference (VT) is provided to a divider 416.The elapsed time calculator 412 also retrieves the stored elapsed timesfor the beginning and the end of the time window from the local datastructure 418 and computes the difference (ET) between the startingvalue and the ending value. The divider 416 receives the elapsed timedifference (ET) from the calculator 412. The divider 416 then computesthe overhead percentage Ov(thread 1)=VT/ET and stores this percentage inthe data structure 418 as schematically illustrated by arrow 422.

An approximation of the total concurrent overhead Ov can then becomputed from the local overhead percentages computed by the concurrentthreads. Although these percentages vary over time, the approximationobtained by summing them is reasonably accurate considering, asdescribed above, that the concurrent overhead is typically constant. Ingeneral, the total overhead would be calculated periodically atintervals that are determined by the desired “granularity” of theresults. For example, the total overhead percentage could be computed at30 millisecond intervals. In particular, each of the data structures inthe local overhead calculators 406, 408 and 410 are linked together sothat another thread can iterate over them to retrieve the stored threadoverhead percentages. The operation of this other thread isschematically illustrated in FIG. 5 and the steps in the process areshown in FIG. 6. The process begins in step 600 and proceeds to step 602where a determination is made whether additional thread data structures500 remain to be processed. Since the data structures are linkedtogether, the first data structure can be located by means of a listhead 501 that points to that data structure. Each data structure thenpoints to the next data structure on the list. If additional datastructures remain to be processed, then the thread overhead percentagein the next unprocessed data structure is retrieved, as set forth instep 606, and applied to a divider 504, as schematically illustrated byarrow 502. As indicated in step 608, the divider 504 divides the threadoverhead percentage by the number of processors. On a multi-processorcomputer, dividing the overhead percentage computed by a singleconcurrent thread by the number of processors yields the fraction of allthe processors that thread occupied in the elapsed time window 310. Forexample, for a time window of 10 ms duration, if the virtual time of aconcurrent refinement thread is 5 ms, that concurrent refinement threadoccupied half a processor for that time window. On a four-processorcomputer system, that thread would occupy 12.5% of all processors.

Next, the adjusted ratio is applied to a summer 508 as indicatedschematically by arrow 506 where, in step 610, the adjusted overheadpercentage for that thread is added to the adjusted percentagescalculated for other threads. The process then returns to step 602 wherea determination is made whether further thread data structures remain tobe processed. Operation continues in this manner until all stored threadoverhead percentages have been processed. The process then ends in step604. The total concurrent overhead percentage, Ov, for all threads isthen found at the output 510 of the summer 508. Alternatively, theoverhead percentages for all threads could be summed and then divided bythe number of processors.

Using the calculated estimate of the overhead percentage of theconcurrent processes, the aforementioned queries can be adjusted to takethis concurrent overhead into account. This process is illustrated inFIGS. 7 and 8. The process begins in step 800 and proceeds to step 802where the time window duration TW (illustrated as 700 in FIG. 7) ismultiplied by the concurrent thread overhead Ov 702 in multiplier 706.The resulting product 712 is applied to a subtractor 710 where, in step804, the product is subtracted from the maximum garbage collection timeMaxGC 708. The product produced by multiplier 706 and the output ofsubtractor 710 are both applied to the evacuation pause calculator 714and used to adjust the queries. For example, given a concurrent overheadpercentage of Ov, in every time window of duration TW ms used in thequeries, the garbage collection activity during that window is adjusted,in step 806, to include TW*Ov of concurrent garbage collection time aswell as any STW garbage collection time in the start/stop pair queue 716as applied to the evacuation pause calculator 714 indicatedschematically by arrow 716. Additionally, when STW pauses must bescheduled, the concurrent overhead must be adjusted in step 808 toreduce the maximum pause time allowed for scheduling STW pauses.Specifically, if the maximum pause time is MaxGC, then the maximum pausetime adjusted for concurrent activity is MaxGC−Ov*TW. The process thenfinishes in step 810.

The time estimates may be further improved by taking into account thatconcurrent garbage collection activities do not take place during STWpauses. Thus, the total garbage collection time can be further adjustedto take this into account. Assuming a goal of MaxGC ms of garbagecollection time out of any time window of duration TW ms during whichthe application is executing and a concurrent overhead percentage Ov (asdetermined above), then the actual amount of STW time (s) allowed in atime window of TW duration can be determined as follows. If the timeduring which the application runs is TW−s, then:MaxGC=s+Ov*(TW−s)which can be restated as:MaxGC=s+Ov*TW−Ov*sorMaxGC=(I−Ov)*s+Ov*TWso thats=(MaxGC−Ov*TW)/(1−Ov)

A software implementation of the above-described embodiment may comprisea series of computer instructions either fixed on a tangible medium,such as a computer readable media, for example, a diskette, a CD-ROM, aROM memory, or a fixed disk, or transmittable to a computer system, viaa modem or other interface device over a medium. The medium either canbe a tangible medium, including but not limited to optical or analogcommunications lines, or may be implemented with wireless techniques,including but not limited to microwave, infrared or other transmissiontechniques. It may also be the Internet. The series of computerinstructions embodies all or part of the functionality previouslydescribed herein with respect to the invention. Those skilled in the artwill appreciate that such computer instructions can be written in anumber of programming languages for use with many computer architecturesor operating systems. Further, such instructions may be stored using anymemory technology, present or future, including, but not limited to,semiconductor, magnetic, optical or other memory devices, or transmittedusing any communications technology, present or future, including butnot limited to optical, infrared, microwave, or other transmissiontechnologies. It is contemplated that such a computer program productmay be distributed as a removable media with accompanying printed orelectronic documentation, e.g., shrink wrapped software, pre-loaded witha computer system, e.g., on system ROM or fixed disk, or distributedfrom a server or electronic bulletin board over a network, e.g., theInternet or World Wide Web.

Although an exemplary embodiment of the invention has been disclosed, itwill be apparent to those skilled in the art that various changes andmodifications can be made which will achieve some of the advantages ofthe invention without departing from the spirit and scope of theinvention. The order of the process steps may also be changed withoutaffecting the operation of the invention. Other aspects, such as thespecific process flow, as well as other modifications to the inventiveconcept are intended to be covered by the appended claims.

1. A method for tracking activity of a garbage collector with aplurality of garbage collector threads that operate concurrently with anoperation of an application program during a time window on a computersystem having a number of processors, the method comprising: for each ofthe plurality of garbage collector threads, computing a percentage ofthe time window during which that garbage collector thread is scheduledfor operation; dividing each percentage computed by the number ofprocessors to obtain a plurality of adjusted percentages; summing theplurality of adjusted percentages to obtain a total overhead percentage;multiplying the total overhead percentage computed by a duration of thetime window in order to determine a garbage collection time attributableto the plurality of garbage collector threads during the time window;adjusting the activity of the garbage collector to include the garbagecollection time attributable to the plurality of garbage collectorthreads during the time window and a garbage collection timeattributable to a stop-the-world (STW) garbage collection pause; andadjusting a maximum pause time allowed for the STW garbage collectionpause.
 2. The method of claim 1 wherein each of the plurality of garbagecollector threads computes the percentage of the time window duringwhich that garbage collector thread is scheduled for operation andstores the percentage of the time window in a local data structure. 3.The method of claim 1 wherein a total garbage collection time limit isspecified by a user and wherein the method further comprises: reducingthe total garbage collection time limit by the garbage collection timeattributable to the plurality of garbage collector threads during thetime window.
 4. An apparatus for tracking activity of a garbagecollector with a plurality of garbage collector threads that operateconcurrently with an operation of an application program during a timewindow, the apparatus comprising: a computer system having a number ofprocessors; a local overhead calculator in each of the plurality ofgarbage collector threads that computes a corresponding percentage ofthe time window during which that garbage collector thread is scheduledfor operation; and a mechanism executing on the computer system,including: a divider that divides the corresponding percentage of eachof the plurality of garbage collector threads by the number ofprocessors to obtain a plurality of adjusted percentages; a summer thatsums the plurality of adjusted percentages to obtain a total overheadpercentage; a multiplier that multiplies the total overhead percentagecomputed by the summer by a duration of the time window in order todetermine a garbage collection time attributable to the plurality ofgarbage collector threads during the time window; and an evacuationpause calculator that: adjusts the activity of the garbage collector toinclude the garbage collection time attributable to the plurality ofgarbage collector threads during the time window and a garbagecollection time attributable to a stop-the-world (STW) garbagecollection pause; and adjusts a maximum pause time allowed for the STWgarbage collection pause.
 5. The apparatus of claim 4 wherein each localoverhead calculator comprises a mechanism that stores the correspondingpercentage of each of the plurality of garbage collector threads in alocal data structure stored on the computer system.
 6. The apparatus ofclaim 4 wherein a total garbage collection time limit is specified by auser and wherein the apparatus further comprises a mechanism thatreduces the total garbage collection time limit by the garbagecollection time attributable to the plurality of garbage collectorthreads during the time window.
 7. A computer readable medium storinginstructions for tracking activity of a garbage collector with aplurality of garbage collector threads that operate concurrently with anoperation of an application program during a time window, theinstructions executable on a processor and comprising functionality to:compute, for each of the plurality of garbage collector threads, acorresponding percentage of the time window during which that garbagecollector thread is scheduled for operation; divide the correspondingpercentage of each of the plurality of garbage collector threads by thenumber of processors to obtain a plurality of adjusted percentages; sumthe plurality of adjusted percentages to obtain a total overheadpercentage; multiply the total overhead percentage by a duration of thetime window in order to determine a garbage collection time attributableto the plurality of garbage collector threads during the time window;adjust the activity of the garbage collector to include the garbagecollection time attributable to the plurality of garbage collectorthreads during the time window and a garbage collection timeattributable to a stop-the-world (STW) garbage collection pause; andadjust a maximum pause time allowed for the STW garbage collectionpause.
 8. The computer readable medium of claim 7, wherein theinstructions further comprise functionality to store the correspondingpercentage in a local data structure on the computer system.
 9. Thecomputer readable medium of claim 7, wherein a total garbage collectiontime limit is specified by a user, and wherein the instructions furthercomprise functionality to: reduce the total garbage collection timelimit by the garbage collection time attributable to the plurality ofgarbage collector threads during the time window.